Letters -- Published Nov. 16, 2012

Friday

Nov 16, 2012 at 12:01 AM

Regarding your Oct. 18 article "New spin on moon's creation," scientists could know exactly how the moon and earth were formed in about five minutes if they would bother to read the first chapter of Genesis.

Regarding your Oct. 18 article "New spin on moon's creation," scientists could know exactly how the moon and earth were formed in about five minutes if they would bother to read the first chapter of Genesis.

I know it's too simplistic for their intellectual minds, but it makes a whole lot more sense than all their silly ideas. It tells us in Gen. 1:1 "That God created the heavens and the Earth." Then in the rest of the chapter it tells us how he did it. God spoke the universe into existence.

Isn't that simple? Evolution leaves so many holes in it that it cannot hold water, but the Bible fills all the holes with just a few words. It is so rational that science can't accept it. For them it just has to be more complicated than that.

Calvin Hogue

Stockton

Recently I took my husband grocery shopping with me for the first time in a while. We had been eating mostly chicken and fish and decided we would like a nice steak.

Both of us were shocked when we looked at the price of beef. The price of beef has gone through the roof. One steak cost us close to $12.

Why the high prices? Well I asked a friend whose family is into farming. The answer is simple. The current government is mandating that 40 percent of the corn crop go to producing ethanol for gas to fuel our vehicles.

Everyone knows that the best beef is corn fed. With 40 percent going to fuel our vehicles, that leaves only 60 percent for the cattle.

It the simple law of supply and demand.

Our government is interfering with the supply and demand of corn. More restrictions and more regulations result in less corn and higher prices. The result is some clean air but no one being able to afford to eat beef.

I'll take reasonable prices for beef over EPA regulations any day. Less government, lower prices.

Linda Silverman

Manteca

» NOTE: There is no government mandate that 40 percent of corn go into ethanol production, although that was roughly the amount that's diverted by growers into ethanol. That diversion was largely because of a three-decade-old, $20 billion federal tax credit for ethanol production. Congress allowed that subsidy to expire in January.

In April, the Calaveras Visitors Bureau invited lodging members to a meeting with Civitas, a Tourism Marketing District consultant company. The CVB had already negotiated a contract with Civitas at a cost of upwards of $40,000 without lodging support!

At a September CVB meeting, lodging members were asked to decide between pursuing the TMD with Civitas or support a transient occupancy tax increase by partnering with Steve Wilensky's "Citizens for a Better Calaveras" special interest groups.

The CVB's decision: "put the brakes on TMD for now and move forward with T.O.T, circling back to TMD if T.O.T doesn't pass."

The CVB spent occupancy tax proceeds to hire Civitas, and then turned around and brokered a deal with the CBC, showing a lack of core management, accountability and responsibility to lodging, which funds the CVB.

The CVB's sole purpose has always been to represent lodging and advocate tourism for Calaveras County.

The CVB is treating the lodging community like a "cash cow," without any thought.

We need people to want to stay in our lodging facilities for one or two nights, to fill our restaurants, and spend their money in our shops, which allows businesses to thrive, so owners can keep their doors open, and employees get to keep their jobs, which creates a win/win for everyone.

By not involving lodging before making any crucial decisions that would ultimately impact lodging negatively, that sets the tone for conflict between lodging and CVB, which creates a lose/lose for Calaveras County.